


Awareness

by dsa_archivist



Category: due South
Genre: Drama, First Time, Humor, M/M, Slash
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2004-12-12
Updated: 2004-12-12
Packaged: 2018-11-10 13:27:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,574
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11127861
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dsa_archivist/pseuds/dsa_archivist
Summary: I'm not reccomending drug use, here. Just an idea that hit while I was, again, trying to work on the tenth Dog story.





	Awareness

**Author's Note:**

> Note from Speranza, the archivist: this story was once archived at [Due South Archive](http://fanlore.org/wiki/Due_South_Archive). To preserve the archive, I began manually importing its works to the AO3 as an Open Doors-approved project in June 2017. I tried to reach out to all creators about the move and posted announcements, but may not have reached everyone. If you are (or know) this creator, please contact me using the e-mail address on [Due South Archive collection profile](http://archiveofourown.org/collections/duesoutharchive).

  
Awareness

## Awareness

by Blue Champagne

Disclaimer: 

Author's Notes: I HOPE my spellchecker WORKED this time.

Story Notes: 

* * *

* * *

"Um, no sir. He's not doing anything really scary or anythin'. Just, um...just looking at stuff. Like he's never seen it before." Ray sniffed, rather more deeply than usually. 

"Yeah, I've heard of stuff that makes you do that. I think they call it lysergic acid. You sure he's not going to try to fly off the fire escape?" 

"No, sir, it's not like that. They let him out of the-- _heeyahCHOOO!!_ " 

"I believe you were about to say 'hospital', Detective?" 

"Yeah, thank you sir." Ray sniffed and scrubbed irritatedly at his nose with a paper towel, which triggered another sneeze. This time, he was a little more careful wiping up, then said "The same substance is...appears...they say it's an allergen to some people, sir. And I already got some airborne allergies, act up sometimes." 

"Everyone who's heard you talk--or how often you sniff--knows that. But you're telling me somebody's come up with a combination of cut and designer that will go that far across the reaction spectrum, span that many systems--do just about anything to anybody, depending on the individual?" 

"Uh, I don't think they went that far, sir, it's not like they've got any kind of real sample to work with here, they got nothing to extrapolate on. The way they explained it to me is that everybody has bio--biological, biochemical, characteristics that make them react uniquely, just a little different from everybody else, to _any_ chemical, including ones that are part of even food and clothes and buildings and things like that. Everybody's got a different chemical balance, and even everybody's individual balance is always changing, going with the flow, taking in what there is to take in and rolling with the changes, you know?" 

"Yeah, I've had biology classes, Detective. Go on." 

"This stuff just seems to take that to some kind of extreme, and like I said, they got no idea why yet. We do know of drugs that have massively different effects on different people--what might save one person would kill another and it might look like all else was being equal, even. There's no telling how it's gonna hit anybody, since it's hit maybe five people total we know about. All we do know is there hasn't been any dangerous, or even really severe, reaction so far. Some people it might bliss out. Some people it might act like caffeine. Some people it--it-- _hheeyahCHOOO_!" 

"Acts like an allergen to their immune system." 

"Kinda lookin' that way, yeah, sir," Ray sighed wetly, reaching for a fresh paper towel. "They gave me some super allergy medicine at the hospital. Just hasn't kicked in yet, I guess, I only took it about twenty minutes ago." 

"So...you think you'll need a little while to be sure you're okay? Um...these chumps aren't worth any serious hump-busting; we got 'em before they could churn out anything but...whatever the hell that joke powder is gonna end up being classified, and the biohazard team head says they've got it all. Obviously it's a fuckup, not anything widespread. We got statements; and since they talked to us, got a deal, we got low flight risk--we've offered protection if they'll tell us who supplied 'em with the equipment and raw material. And anything else they know, cough up like they got emphysema. We can do without you until Wednesday, when we do the official talking with the legal teams on both sides." 

"I think I may not be the one who needs the time, sir. I'm a little fadey from the antihistamines--they got some powerful antihistamines at the hospital, man--but mostly I don't wanna leave Fraser alone." 

"I figured. I might as well let you off or you'd fake your own death to keep an eye on him. What's he doing now? The moldings fascinating?" 

"No, he's looking at the steak knife block." 

"Jesus. He's not drooling, is he?" 

"No. In fact, he's got his hands folded behind his back while he sort of...looks it over around, face real close. He looks like he does when he wants to get a close look at evidence, but not touch it." 

"You think he's aware...that he's not in any condition to touch knives, or something?" 

"Either that or he thinks they're some sorta evidence." 

"And you say he hasn't done...anything dangerous, even for him. Like, normal for him." 

"That's what's weird, sir. Even his usual shit, the stuff that might kill ordinary humans, he's not doin' it, even though there were a couple opportunities since he first got a lungful. It's like he's on a break. Like he's...bein' a tourist, or something, only, like, we are observing your earth. He had a great time on the ride home. He had the window open, just grinning like a fool at absolutely jack shit." 

"Sounds like he _is_ having a little mind-expansion. Let's hope he has a pleasant trip. What'd he say?" 

Ray ahemed a moment, which initiated another sneeze, then said "That's...um. He hasn't said much." 

"Fraser? Hasn't said much?" 

"Not really, sir." 

"Get him back to the hospital, pronto." 

"No, I..." Ray stopped to watch Fraser wander across the room and settle to his haunches in front of the stereo, gazing at the moving lights. He wore his intent, fascinated look, and was smiling very slightly. 

"Well, what _has_ he said? He's gotta have had some observations to make, but his statement read like somebody swiped his vocabulary, it--was...fuck it. His statement was _you_ , wasn't it? _You_ did his statement, you coached and prodded and he tugged his collar and nodded and the officer taking it just took you two for granted and wrote. Shit." Welsh had made him, all right. 

"Okay _yeah_ , I helped with his part of the uh, statement. He...look, he's--" 

"Detective. Is he talking at all?" 

Ray only paused, but that was evidently enough for Welsh. "Do you know if he _can_ talk? Do you know if he can still speak ENGLISH? We don't _know_ what this stuff can do to the _brain_ , to any individual's brain, we don't know--" 

"Lou, c'mon, I wouldn't take him out of the hospital if I thought he--look, he answers--he looks at me--if I call him. Responds, you know. He's not acting all weirded out or anything, came up and hung up his coat like usual...he does what I ask him to, he shakes his head 'no thanks', stuff like that. I even asked him if he could talk, and he just smiled and nodded at me. For some reason, he just _isn't_. That's all." 

"The mountie isn't talking. Ray, you've gotta get--" 

"Sir, he patrols miles and _miles_ of bumblefuck _zip_ up there in the Northwest Territories. He is _used_ to going weeks, maybe months, without talking to anybody except maybe the wolf, and the wolf's only the last couple, maybe four years tops, a couple of those spent here in Chicago. He's used to either nothing or the neverending story, okay? I think he's just decided to go with nothing for a while. I think he's...resting." 

There was a sigh and a long pause. "Resting." 

"Yeah. Something. A sabbatical kind of thing. Lou, listen--" Ray dropped his voice, glad the stereo was playing. "I love Fraser like a brother, here, you know that. I wouldn't let any weird drug hurt his bizarro brain. The aid response teams at the precinct are on alert for just the kind of problem we could expect, here--maintaining brain function if it starts to be compromised. They got all the right equipment together and the team on call knows the situation, I called and made myself very, very _heeYAHCHOOO_ _aigh_ (snort) _clear_ , if you get my drift. One beep from my cellphone and they are five minutes away, ready to start as soon as they get here and to get him to the hospital in ten, fifteen outside. Or me either, for that matter, and I may beep 'em for that yet." He sniffed around a little, then muttered "The hell with it," and gave a mighty blast into the wad of paper towels he was holding. 

"Thank you for sharing, Detective." 

"Oh. Sorry. Yeah...the, uh, phone's, a little..." Ray was shaking snot from his fingers to any handy surface, seizing another paper towel and wiping. "Sorry. Like I was saying. We'll be fine. He'll be fine. I don't...I don't like...I don't know how to put this, sir. I don't want him to miss out, sitting in some hospital, with nothing to...appreciate but...fuck, a goddamn _hospital_." 

There was silence at the other end of the phone, and finally Welsh sighed. "Informed. You will keep me informed. You will die to keep me informed if you must. This is clear?" 

"This is clear. This is very clear. This is crystal. I will die. I understand." 

"I could wish. You call me first thing in the morning." 

"I'll definitely do that, sir." 

"Take care of him, Detective. And yourself. Hit the emergency if there's the slightest problem. God, I should not be doing this." 

"You were fine 'til you heard Fraser wasn't talking." 

"Listen to that sentence carefully, Detective, and you will hopefully understand the idiocy of what you have just said to me. Goodnight." Click. 

Ray sighed. Then he grabbed frantically for the paper towels. "EEEYAAAAH _CH_ \--"... 

* * *

With the help of the antihistamines, Ray felt much better, but was blurry and maybe a little too spaced to be looking after anyone else--his usual stuffy-head remedy was Sudafed, a decongestant rather than an antihistamine, and a whole different boat; it wasn't what was called for here--but Fraser didn't seem to need much looking after. He mostly wandered around the apartment, just _looking_ at things, smiling to himself a little. He would occasionally pick things up and examine them closely, then suddenly turn around and stare thoughtfully at the desk or something else that Ray could see no connection at all to. He played staredown with Warpspeed for almost forty minutes while the turtle rested in his pond, though Fraser kind of cheated when he dropped some food into the terrarium and distracted the little guy. He checked the timer on the light--Warpspeed needed a certain amount from his special lamp every day--and moved on. 

Finally, Ray, in front of the TV, drooling at an aged black-and-white that was likely making some old-timey director spin in his grave because it had been colorized, noticed Fraser actually examining the _moldings_ , just as Welsh had said, and he said "Okay, I can't take it. Fraser, _what_ do you see looking at all this stuff around here, _what_ are you looking at?" 

Fraser actually spoke, which he hadn't really been expecting, nor what Fraser said. 

"You." Fraser gave him a sort of--for Fraser, which meant there was genuine affection in the expression--knowing smirk, and kept wandering around, looking, now making his way into the bathroom. 

"You're lookin' at me in the bathroom?" Ray whispered, staring after him. He didn't expect an answer, nor get one. 

* * *

Fraser was lying next to Ray, watching him, when Ray opened his eyes. 

"How'd I get to bed?" Ray slurred, looking around himself in confusion. He was in his underwear and under the sheets and everything. 

Fraser smiled and didn't say anything. 

Ray covered his face with his hands. "Oh, man. I went out, in front of the tube, and you led me in here and prodded me along 'til I got in, didn't you?" 

Still smiling, Fraser nodded. It was at that point that Ray noticed that Fraser was also under the covers, and he didn't even have his T-shirt on. Ray did not, at least at this point, want to know about any of the rest. Frase was lying on his side, kind of curled up, with his head tilted back just slightly to look at Ray. The last of the waxing moon's light through the window made his slumped and snuggled shoulders look all smooth and big and round, like hills covered with snow, only with an aura of skin-gleam that suggested softness, warmth, smoothness, with an almost irresistible arc into his equally tempting neck. 

"Are you done looking around?" Ray asked, by way of distracting himself. Fraser looked so inviting just now he'd better start in with _something_ distracting. Of course, Fraser having gotten in bed with him could be read a really good way, so maybe he should be taking advantage, but Fraser was maybe sort of fucked up, so he couldn't count it. 

Fraser nodded again, his smile a little bigger, like he was about to burst into a grin, but was saving it; his eyes narrowed a little, but they didn't crinkle up like they did sometimes; it was kind of a secretive look. 

"And what, pray tell, have you learned, trolling around my little hole of a bachelor apartment?" Okay, maybe he was being a little rough on the apartment. He'd sure lived worse places, and might again yet. 

Fraser broke into a smile with a hint of teeth this time, but not a full-on grin, and leaned over and kissed Ray, firm and warm, on the mouth, just once, then leaned back to his own pillow. 

Ray gulped, his eyes crossed, and he turned his head away to sneeze hard, hearing the sound of soft giggling from Fraser. Asshole, he thought fondly, as he groped for the kleenex by the bed. Wiping up, he asked "It that your way of telling me that what you found out is you like me, or that you just aren't talking yet?" He made sure to look back toward Fraser. It was kind of like talking to Dief that way, only you had to look at Fraser, at the moment, to _hear_ him, not talk to him. 

Fraser just looked thoughtful a moment, then nodded and smiled again. 

"Both, huh." 

Another nod. 

Ray finished blowing and wiping and lay down again and was instantly enveloped. Okay, that answered the shorts question; Fraser probably had washed them and they were now hanging on the towel rod in the bathroom to be clean for the morning. He snugged Ray up with utter, flowing, joint-rolling and hip-sliding abandon, not only like Fraser never would, but like no average adult guy _alive_ ever would--if he was totally straight and sober and stuff at least--and sighed into his neck, and fell asleep like a rock. 

"Please," Ray thought. "Please don't let the stuff make him _talky_ at the station." 

* * *

Ray was awakened by the smell of coffee. He'd have preferred to be awakened by the feeling of Fraser's body, but there was also the smell of Fraser in the bed, which was better than nothing, for sure. There was also the feeling that he'd slept in a warm bath, acheless and loose, which he supposed might happen if you weren't used to sleeping with someone, especially someone who radiated like Fraser. Stella had been too small for the effect to get that noticeable, apparently. 

Fraser appeared in the doorway with a coffee cup, strolling casually over to Ray with an easy smile on his face. Ray had never _seen_ this guy before. He looked _just_ like Fraser, but he didn't move like Fraser or act like Fraser. Still, there was an essential Fraserness that couldn't be denied, and Ray might not be able to pinpoint where it was coming from--Fraser probably had an alien transponder in his brain or something, which would explain a lot--but there it was. 

Fraser leaned down and stroked Ray's face with a finger, cheekbone to chin, then proffered the cup with a lift of his eyebrows. 

"Good morning to you, too. And yes, thanks--urk--" Ray worked some spit into his mouth and started hauling himself up on the pillows. "--I'll take a coffee. You're, uh...still into the nudity thing, I see." Fraser was wandering around the place naked, without a bit of thought to it that Ray could detect. _Had_ to be aliens. Call Mulder. Nah, wait--not the nutbar. Call _Scully_. 

Fraser looked down at himself, then backed up at Ray, pointing back over his shoulder with his thumb, adding a helpless shrug. 

"Oh. We can take it all down to the dryers in the basement, I'll loan you some sweats and socks. For that matter, we could've...okay, maybe not the laundry room last night, you were probably right about that, but I hope you didn't try to hand-wash the tunic and stuff in there. Sweats, dresser, top drawer, if you wanna grab 'em, not that you're cold, most likely." Ray sipped coffee. Hot, not just tap-water hot, and chocolatey sweet. "Mm. Love you, Frase." 

Fraser gave him a "Well, duh," expression--possibly the only time Ray had ever seen that look on his face--and turned to the dresser, where he pulled out a couple of pairs of sweats until he found a greyed-out PD pair that the waistband elastic had completely died in, and was now being used therein purely as a drawstring. He undid the knot and started pulling them on, careful not to lose the ends of the limp elastic. Ray'd had a brief hope of getting Fraser into some of his boxer-briefs--Jesus, what an image, those things a couple sizes too small on Frase--but this came damn close. The things hung like a sack on Ray, which was why he liked them--it was embarrassing, working the heavy bag with all these big muscular guys around, when you were so _skinny_ and pretty much assless--but Fraser oughtta look like a million bucks. 

Ray savored his coffee. "So...how do you feel?" 

Fraser looked up at him and smiled, giving him a thumbs up, before turning his attention back to the drawstring knot. 

Well, shit. 

Now what? 

"'Informed, or I will die'," Ray sighed, and reached for the phone by the bed. 

* * *

This was actually getting kind of cool. Ray was discovering that not only had they gotten back their ability to be the right hand to the other's left and in crucial situations, Fraser barely had to do a thing for Ray to understand him. A shrug, a hand gesture, a nod in a particular direction, a raised eyebrow--each could literally speak volumes, the entirety of what Fraser wanted to say simply unfolding like a paragraph in a book when Ray asked. 

It didn't seem to be slowing him down with Dief, either. Of course, Dief, who usually took advantage of being at Ray's to wallow in the comparative luxury, and get attention and snacks from Ray, wasn't really up for a lot right now anyhow; too busy chilling out. But if Fraser did need to communicate with him, it seemed to be accomplishable with a mere look between them. Ray understood that. He and Fraser had done it, way more than once. And Dief and Fraser had been partners even longer. 

"Just outta curiosity, since we're planning on going back in tomorrow, you gonna be talking?" 

Fraser gave a sideways nod of his head, as though to say "As necessary" or "it's handleable" without taking his eyes from the documentary he was watching. 

"You talk to me now?" 

Fraser looked at him then, brow drawn, and shook his head with a tiny shrug. Obviously a "Why?" or an "I don't understand the point of it." 

"Well, because--I dunno why because. Well, yes I do. I guess I just wanna make sure you _can_. It's...it's neat that we can do this, cool that we can do this. But I gotta answer to Welsh about the way we handled this case, and you're gonna have to answer to the Inspector, and...um, you're gonna make me get mushy." 

Fraser gave him an unrepentant smirk. 

"Asshole. Okay. I miss the sound of your voice." 

Fraser gave him a gaffed-fish, dropjawed "You _do_?" look. 

"Yes, I do, okay? Say something to me. Say anything to me. Say your name. Say _my_ name. 'Cause I'm liking this, but if it's gonna be a new regular thing, we need to work out some details. Sometimes, you're gonna haveta _talk_. Sometimes you're probably gonna haveta yell, for that matter. Also, you might still be fucked up. I got no way to tell whether I should take you to the hospital." 

Fraser's expression crumpled, and he laid a hand on Ray's shoulder. 

"No, no, don't be sorry, it's okay. I can tell you're pretty much fine. I just gotta know for sure you can talk beyond the one word you said to me last night." 

"I love you, Ray." Fraser smiled, pleased with his demonstration, then turned back to the TV. 

Ray sat there gobsmacked a minute, then got up, muttering "Oh, God," and heading for the kitchen. When he came back, he had a beer. 

When Fraser frowned at it, Ray said "Because you're scaring me here! Even if there _is_ still some of that shit floating around in me, all it did was make me sneeze, I'll take the interaction chance, here. This is doing something to... _you_. Which might turn out to be something I don't like. I don't like it when you give me too much information, but I like too much information better than I like the idea of not having _you_. I love--hell, Fraser, you know I love you, too. But you been doing deeply weird shit and I need more than an I love you, much as I might appreciate the thought. Now say something that sounds _you_ , that shows me that the guy I love with all my heart to tell to _can_ it is still in there. You don't have to keep it up. Just show me you--" 

"Ray, a parallelogram is a quadrilateral with both pairs of opposite sides parallel. How was that?" Fraser folded his arms and looked back at the TV, shaking his head in mild annoyance. 

Ray smiled. "That was perfect. That was perfect, Fraser. Thank you." 

Fraser gave him a little upward curl of his lips and a sideways glance that said "Don't mention it." 

"You wanna sleep over tonight? Since we got your stuff freshened up..." 

Fraser gave him another "duh" look, with some honest puzzlement in it this time, took Ray's free hand and folded it loosely in both of his own, holding it in his lap. He kept watching the tube. 

Okay, some of these signals just were _not_ coming across, though about ninety percent of them were. For one thing, Fraser was relaxed, had been all day. _Reaally_ relaxed. Ray figured the drugs, but he was beginning to think they'd done their thing and fucked off, since he'd been pouring both diuretic and non-diuretic beverages down Fraser all day, and plus Fraser had just demonstrated some actual very-mildly-snippy-tensed Fraser, which showed that at least _that_ was in there if he wanted to indulge it, or indulge Ray with it, or whatever. 

"Do you really miss the sound of my voice?" Fraser asked suddenly, so softly that Ray, startled into jumping and almost losing his beer, had to get his shit back together before saying "Yeah, um...yeah. Yeah, I do. Not like I want you to babble constantly or anything, don't get me wrong, 'cause I mean this quiet thing is nice, I guess, some, you know, different, but--" 

"Ray," Fraser cut him off gently, and turned off the TV with the remote, then kept holding Ray's hand in both his as he scooted around a little on the couch, closed his eyes, and begin to sing in the deeper register of his voice. Ray recognized the melody--he'd heard it in church, usually women singing it, but Fraser was taking it the octave down, making the soft, slow fading in and out of each of the long-held, soaring and diving syllables even more mesmerizing. "Karitas...habundat, in omnia...de imis...excellentissima..." 

Ray almost held his breath through the song, especially near the high notes on "atque amantissima" not because he thought Fraser wouldn't make it, but because he knew he would--and he did, the sound floating effortlessly up and out into the air, before gliding back down on the "in omnia". Jesus. Ray was getting a hardon from this, the way Fraser strengthened, held, and gently lowered the volume of each note, his vibrato soft and in perfect control. Ray told the hardon to shut up. Last ten years or so, he'd learned he had that ability, finally. Damn convenient at times. 

Ray was quiet, and when Fraser was done, he stayed quiet a long time; so was Fraser, motionless, after the last note of the song died out in the room. Ray felt wrapped in a blanket of peace. "That's...not the kind of thing you ordinarily do," Ray managed after a bit. "I would've expected something about logging or sailing. Or skinning squirrels or something." 

Fraser turned his head and squeezed his hand, the look in his eyes soft. 

Ray's eyes widened. "...just for me? Why? You like to sing, Frase. Why not...sing all the ways you can, if you can sing all those different ways?" 

Fraser touched a fingertip to Ray's nose, smiling. 

"But why save that particular...uh, brand, only for me?" 

"Because you love me," Fraser said, leaned forward and kissed him softly. 

Ray fell when Fraser pulled back because all his muscles had stopped holding him up; since he was leaning forward, he fell into Fraser's lap, which was, of course, just fine. 

"Will you tell me about the trip you took on that stuff, Fraser?" Ray finally managed to choke. "So that you...did...shit, you haven't been fucked up at all, probably not even in bed last night. Talk to me, I need words here, Fraser." 

"No, I haven't been," Fraser said quietly. "Just...me. Because for the first time in my life, I'm with someone who accepts all of me." 

Ray flopped onto his back, staring up at Fraser in confusion. "I'm not--I flip you shit all the time!" 

"Which has nothing to do with what I'm talking about. There isn't anything in me you don't accept. Even the things I can't accept." 

"Vecchio accepted you. Vecchio would commit _murder_ for you, he took a _bullet_ for you--" 

"Ray Vecchio loves me dearly, and I love him just as much, despite our penchant--" (he gave the word its French pronunciation), "--for getting each other shot. But there are things in me he can't accept. He pretends they're not there--it's an agree-to-disagree sort of viewpoint, with the two of us, in some areas. It will never lessen the feelings between us. But as much as you argue, as much as you complain, you still...you just...accept. Everything." 

"Well...maybe I'd accept everything at least once." 

Fraser's mouth curled into a smirk, then an affectionate smile as he stroked Ray's face. "I suppose that's one way of putting it." 

"And that's what you...figured out about me, on that stuff?" 

"I believe I begin to see the attractions, to some artists, of lysergic acid--it causes connections in the brain that are not ordinarily made, creating completely real-seeming perceptions and sensations that have no stimulus in the physical world to cause them. In my case...I think I simply...speeded up." 

"You just...rather than a bunch of wacky new connections, all your regular connections...connected even more?" 

"Yes, exactly. I think it was like...well, something like that, I'm not a doctor, of course. But everywhere I looked, I saw you. I saw you, things about you that I'd never realized--connections being made in my brain that would never have come about otherwise." 

"And your brain _already_ makes connections nobody else's on earth does." 

"So, I...learned you. And one of the things I learned was that I love you profoundly, and that you love me, and accept me entirely. I'm sorry--I don't think I'll ever be able to explain how I managed to get that information from smelling your carpet shampoo and examining the weight-bearing capacity of your towel racks. And other such. In fact, thinking about it now, I don't know how the pieces came together at all. There's only a whole. You. No, not...not just..." 

"Us. There's us. A big us in your head, like...you can do things with me I bet you can't even do with _you_. How often do you wander--okay, did wander, when you had a place--around home naked?" 

"Um. Never, pretty much. Prolonged nudity was a serious danger where I grew up." 

"But now...all mixed up with me. So it was okay. Here, with me. Something _I_ might do." 

"I think you've got it, Ray." 

"You think...this drug...what if you'd been at somebody else's place? You'd have found the same kinda stuff about them, maybe?" 

Fraser laughed outright. "Heavens, no. I would have seen...whoever it was. I might have come to know them as deeply as I do you now, but I sincerely doubt there is anybody alive but you who...would have demonstrated the same things pertaining to _me_ that I found in you." 

"So...it's not the drug that...made you..." 

"No. Not the drug. Sped up the process, perhaps. Maybe...made it possible. It might not have happened, otherwise, or it might have. Who knows. But I can't imagine..." he shook his head. "I can't imagine _this_. Having happened, no matter how many years...even if we'd had the years. Not like...this. I'm sorry, Ray. I wish I could explain better." 

"You..." Ray cleared his throat, considered getting up from where he was on his back in Fraser's lap, then decided to show some balls and said "You...we...keep saying love. And you kissed me. Twice. But with what you're talking about, that doesn't necessarily mean...I mean, you feel that deep about somebody, maybe you kiss 'em without even wanting to...to jump 'em." He muttered the last, looking away. 

"Ray...to me, it's like we already have done what you're implying. Far more than that, in fact." 

Ray's gaze flashed back up. 

Fraser smiled. "In...inside me, yes. Not that I wouldn't appreciate a comparative experiment." 

"Then you do mean..." 

"I mean the word love with every possible connotation it has, Ray, when it comes to you. Every one. As a lover, a child, a friend, a companion, a brother, even a teacher or a mentor. It's all so...meaningless, just words, sounds. This is...I can't describe it. I wish more than anything that I could, especially since the look on your face indicates you don't consider the listing I just gave you to be entirely a sound one, speaking psychologically; that some of those sorts of love _shouldn't_ go together. But you're wrong. With this, they do. With this, it... _is_." 

"It is that it is, huh, Frase?" Ray chewed his lip pensively. 

"And we are that we are. And whatever happens now, that will always be true." 

Ray could only lie there staring for a few minutes. "I don't believe any of this." 

"I'm wondering when I'm going to wake up myself." He caressed Ray's chest soothingly. 

"That wasn't what I needed to hear, Mr. Omniscient." 

"No, but it was the truth. I love you like this, and _have_. Have you here, like this." He shook his head. "You aren't the only one who believed your only chance was gone, Ray. And this is much more than that was. At least...to me. I have to remember...you didn't experience what I did, last night." 

"Then tell me as we go. I learn good by doing. Tell me about it as it comes up, okay? You'll never have any luck sitting there trying to make an essay in your head about it." 

Fraser gave a rueful twist of his lips and nodded. "I'm afraid you're quite right about that, my usual tendencies in that direction notwithstanding." 

Ray grinned. "Now I know you're okay." 

Fraser smiled. "I'll have to remember to keep annoying you. I'd never realized how much parts of you love it." 

"Oh, _no_ \--" Ray covered his face. "You know shit like _that_? I am so _fucked_." 

"I'd never use it to hurt you, Ray." 

"Just mess with me a little." 

Fraser leaned down over him, his lips just brushing Ray's ear, and murmured "You like it when I mess with you a little. Just like with me." 

"There is such a thing as too much awareness in a relationship." 

"I'm afraid it's too late to worry about that. At least from my side of things." 

"Could we have sex? That's something I can definitely handle at this point." 

"I'd love to. Though I suggest the bed." 

"Yeah, my thinking...exactly..." Ray trailed off and giggled, gazing up at an equally happy--especially if the tears in his eyes over his smile were anything to go by--Fraser. 

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End Awareness by Blue Champagne:

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